The ladies of Wisteria Lane are undergoing a period of change in this week's action-packed episode of Desperate Housewives. Julie's preparing to bring a baby into the world, a couple decides to call it quits, someone else loses their job and another is planning to do the unthinkable and move away. As if that's not enough, Bree is also facing the prospect of going away - only to jail, not a cul-de-sac in the suburbs.

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Ms Van de Kamp's murder trial is looming and, instead of focusing on the prospect of being locked up for life, she's pining for Tripp and chasing away private investigators thinking they're his prostitutes. A cosy night snuggled on the sofa with her lawyer in front of Casablanca is little help in court when the prosecution blindsides them with her suicide note.

Making reference to her "remorse" and "guilt", and having been written suspiciously close to the night of Chuck's hit and run, the note could be enough to send Bree down for good. It soon looks as though not even the compelling testimony of Susan, Lynette and Gaby will save her.

Needless to say, the ladies are having sleepless nights - well, except for Gaby, who gets a mighty glare from her friends for objecting to the suggestion that they come clean. Though she initially doesn't see the big deal (typical Gaby), she realises how wrong it is to let Bree sacrifice herself while scolding Juanita about letting her sister take the blame for breaking a family heirloom.

To be fair to Gaby, there are probably more reasons why the other ladies can't let themselves shut off. Lynette's also dealing with the guilt of inadvertently banishing Tom to India and decides to convince his boss, Gregg (who is also her date, Gregg) to let him stay.

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Surprisingly Gregg agrees to her half-decent proposal right off the bat, but changes his tune when Lynette rejects his advances. She reveals that there's someone else (hint: it's Tom) and he throws a major hissy fit, blasting Lynette for using him to get back at Tom.

When he talks trash about Lynette at the office the next day, Tom gets all flustered and smacks him in the mouth. As satisfying as this is for Tom and us viewers, it does of course result in him getting fired. The termination has unexpected consequences when Jane realises that the reason Tom got fired was because he stuck up for Lynette. Tom confesses what we've all known since the darn season started - he's still in love with Lynette.

It's strange. For weeks now we've been begging for Tom and Jane to break up so that the Scavos can reunite, but now that it's actually happened we feel a little bit sorry for her. I mean, Jane is a bit of a sneaky snake but she's not exactly evil. It's actually kind of hard to watch her get her heart broken, because at the end of the day her affection for Tom was never in doubt. Her parting line - "If it matters, I loved you" - stings like heck. We feel mean now.

Anyway, there's still not much hope of the Scavos reuniting, because Tom bottles it when he spies a man in their marital home unzipping Lynette's dress. Unbeknownst to him, the man is actually Lee and all he's doing is releasing Lynette from the "hideous" bridesmaid dress picked out by Renee. Oh Housewives, why must you do this to us? It's like you want us to swamp your mailbox with angry letters. I'm still holding out hope for a reunion in the finale. They can't bring the Scavos so close together this many times without giving them a happy ending... can they?

Susan, meanwhile, is lending a helping hand to Julie now that she's turned into a big, grouchy pregnant lady and is freaking out over everything - specifically her doubts about whether Porter will be there for the baby. At first Susan thinks this is just because Porter fainted at the video in their birthing class, but Julie reveals that he's been skipping doctors' appointments and the like.

Like any concerned mother, Susan decides to confront Porter about why he's not being there for Julie. Unlike most, however, she does it by driving to the circus-themed fast food joint where he works and having a heart-to-heart with a clown-shaped intercom.

Porter puts his absence down to his long work hours and the fact that he's feeling guilty about Julie having to give up so much. This convinces Susan to make a bold decision - she will move away from Wisteria Lane to help Julie with the baby and allow her to return to college. Julie is reluctant to let her mother leave the home she loves so dear, but Susan insists that it has too many memories of Mike and it'll be good for her to have a fresh start.

I don't know why, but I never thought that the series could end with one of the Housewives leaving the lane. There have been tons of other crazy scenarios flitting around my head as the finale draws near, but I just always assumed the girls would still be hanging out together afterwards, off-camera. But I suppose it kind of makes sense for at least one of them to bid farewell to Wisteria Lane with us. I would have had my money on Bree though, what with her murder trial.

Speaking of which, there's one more twist at the courtroom when Tripp's private investigator discovers that Ramon Sanchez is really Gaby's stepfather, based on a slip-up she made before the trial. Tripp privately tells Bree that screwing Gaby and revealing the dead man's identity at trial could be the only way of escaping jail. Bree says no, but her look when Gaby shows up with nothing more than a scarf and an apology suggests that a mighty betrayal could be on the cards. Delicious.

So in all, a very solid episode of Desperate Housewives there, full of twists and turns and some proper tense moments at Bree's trial. I'm really looking forward to seeing her fate revealed, especially if she drops Gaby in it somewhere along the way.

In fact I can't wait for the finale now. It's obvious a lot of planning has gone into this final series, what with Bree's seemingly pointless plots from earlier coming back to haunt her. I have complete faith that all the loose threads of the season will be nicely tied up in the last episode, given that it's already started to happen. And if Lynette and Tom finally get back together, even better.